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As early as 5000 b.c., Neolithic people in China sculpted pottery in the shape of structures such as roofs or huts, but the craft reached new heights of popularity during the Han Dynasty (206 b.c.–a.d. 220). In this era of widespread prosperity, a nonhereditary elite class of scholar-officials rose to power. Confucian morality was these men’s lodestar, and many believed immortality was attainable. Funerary objects called mingqi were buried in both grand and humble tombs. Among the most fanci
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